Ducks Get Eliminated By The Golden Knights

Photo: Vegas Golden Knights

By Michael Walters

The Ducks hosted the Golden Knights for Game 6 in Anaheim. Lukas Dostal was in net against Carter Hart. Jansen Harkins drew in for the injured Ryan Poehling.

Vegas struck first in the opening minute of this contest. Mitch Marner scored on a partial breakaway with Jackson LaCombe draped all over him. Marner faked like he was going to shoot left and then backhanded the puck between his legs into the right side of the net instead.

Anaheim went on a power play just over seven minutes into this contest, but Vegas would score shorthanded to take a 2-0 lead. Marner found Brett Howden on a rush in close for a tap in goal.

Vegas went on a power play in the final minutes of the period and Shea Theodore scored. The Golden Knights led 3-0 after the first period.

Mikael Granlund scored on the power play in the second period to get Anaheim on the board. He scored on a shot from the top of the left face-off circle that beat Hart glove side. The Ducks were down 3-1 heading into the third period.

Pavel Dorofeyev scored in the opening minutes of third and later in the period to make it a 5-1 lead. The Ducks wouldn’t score again and lost by the same score.

Analysis:

The Ducks got scored on in the beginning moments of this game. They also gave up shorthanded and power play goals going down 3-0 in the first period. Anaheim had a strong response in the second period, but only managed to get one goal. Vegas got two more in the third period and that’s all she wrote.

Anaheim played almost an identical first period to the one in Game 3. They gave up a goal in the opening minutes and then two special teams goals. Once being down by three goals it’s difficult to try to rally from that kind of hole especially in the playoffs. Literally everything went wrong for them in the first 20 minutes and they couldn’t recover.

The Ducks pushed backed in the second period outshooting the Golden Knights 13 to 9, but only got on the board once. They also outshot Vegas 15 to 3 in the third, but couldn’t get any more past Hart.

One difficult part of this game was Vegas didn’t have Mark Stone or Brayden McNabb in the lineup and they still beat Anaheim. This was pretty much the same case in Game 5 when McNabb was booted out of that game early due to his hit on Poehling. The Ducks couldn’t take advantage of a depleted Vegas team in the last two games.

Special teams was also problematic for Anaheim in this contest and series. They gave up a power play and shorthanded goal in the first period. The Ducks were very effective with their special teams play against the Oilers, but no so much against the Golden Knights.

The Ducks did exceed expectations this season as many didn’t even have them making the playoffs. Once Anaheim got into the playoffs then barely anyone gave them a chance against Edmonton. Not many gave them a chance against Vegas and they had a chance to force a game seven, but fell short.

I will go into a deeper dive on this series and the season on the next podcast. Thank you to everyone who has followed along since the beginning as well as to the newer followers. I appreciate it all season long and wouldn’t be covering this team if it wasn’t for all of you.

Team Notes:

The Ducks were 7-0 in Game 6’s at home in the playoffs.

Teemu Selanne was present for this contest. The Ducks had been previously 4-0 when he was in attendance for the playoff games in Rounds 1 and 2.

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May 15th, 2026